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<h1><a href="https://archiveofourown.org/works/25881031">Living</a> by <a class='authorlink' href='https://archiveofourown.org/users/alifletcher2010/pseuds/alifletcher2010'>alifletcher2010</a></h1>

<table class="full">

<tr><td><b>Category:</b></td><td>A Court of Thorns and Roses Series - Sarah J. Maas</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Genre:</b></td><td>Alternate Universe - Modern Setting, Angst, Angst with a Happy Ending, F/M, Implied/Referenced Abuse, Poetry, References to Depression</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Language:</b></td><td>English</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Status:</b></td><td>Completed</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Published:</b></td><td>2020-08-13</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Updated:</b></td><td>2020-08-13</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Packaged:</b></td><td>2021-05-05 09:50:01</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Rating:</b></td><td>Teen And Up Audiences</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Warnings:</b></td><td>No Archive Warnings Apply</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Chapters:</b></td><td>1</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Words:</b></td><td>2,320</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Publisher:</b></td><td>archiveofourown.org</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Story URL:</b></td><td>https://archiveofourown.org/works/25881031</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Author URL:</b></td><td>https://archiveofourown.org/users/alifletcher2010/pseuds/alifletcher2010</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Summary:</b></td><td><div class="userstuff">
              <p>This is life</p><p> </p><p>There is color<br/>But it is dull<br/>No happiness<br/>But no sadness either<br/>Muted<br/>Apathy<br/>Endless days<br/>All the same</p><p>This is life</p><p>But it is not living</p>
            </div></td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Relationships:</b></td><td>Feyre Archeron/Rhysand</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Comments:</b></td><td>9</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Kudos:</b></td><td>41</td></tr>

</table>

<a name="section0001"><h2>Living</h2></a>
<div class="story"><div class="fff_chapter_notes fff_head_notes"><b>Author's Note:</b><blockquote class="userstuff">
      <p>Oh hello there. Yes it’s me. Yes I’m finally posting some writing. If you’ve been following me on tumblr, you know its been a complicated year for me (as I’m sure it has been for all of you)...I moved, had a baby, baby needed pt, I lost my aunt, my anxiety/depression went a little nuts...on top of everything else going on in the world right now. But I’m more settled now and am finally writing/posting again. Something about this year has made me write poetry again and this came from that. </p><p>I have a few other one shots to post and yes, I will definitely be updating my WIPs, I haven’t abandoned them! Love you all, thanks for sticking around, here’s to surviving 2020!</p><p>CW: depression, references to domestic abuse</p>
    </blockquote></div><div class="userstuff module">
    
    <p></p><blockquote>
  <p>
    <em>This is life</em>
  </p>
  <p>
    <em><br/>There is color<br/>But it is dull<br/>No happiness<br/>But no sadness either<br/>Muted<br/>Apathy<br/>Endless days<br/>All the same</em>
  </p>
  <p>
    <em>This is life</em>
  </p>
  <p>
    <em>But it is not living</em>
  </p>
</blockquote><p>Rhys stares at the blinking cursor on the open document. His agent said he needed more, that the start was good, but books of poetry weren’t usually bestsellers and if he wanted to get published, he needed more. But his creativity is sapped, no words come to him.</p><p>The words used to come so easily. It was how he coped, writing out the pain, keeping him away from the nightmares. Then it became a glimmer, an idea, of how he could live his life on his own terms. Now, it’s a chore and it weighs heavily on him.</p><p>He glances at the clock. It was 2AM. Minutes ago he could have sworn it was midnight. But time didn’t really make sense to him these days. Weeks would fly by without him even noticing, not that it mattered. Nothing interesting ever happened to him, nothing broke him from the routine of work and writing. It was all the same endless day. He pulls himself away from the computer and shuffles to bed, not even bothering to take off his work clothes.</p><p>His alarm buzzes just hours later, far too soon. But he doesn’t care. He goes through the motions of getting ready, eats  the same breakfast without tasting, ties the same black tie, shrugs on the same dark suit, walks the same route to the station, takes the same subway, walks into the same high rise office. It’s all the same, day in day out.</p><p>Rhys settles into his desk and tries to focus on work. Working for his father, in this soulless corporation, is just a means to an end. It puts food on the table and pays the bills. Writers don’t make money, poets even less, as his father made it so evidently clear.</p><p></p><blockquote>
  <p>
    <em>You fire words at me<br/>Like bullets from a gun</em>
  </p>
  <p>
    <em>Each one aimed to kill<br/>But they bounce off</em>
  </p>
  <p>
    <em>I don’t care<br/>So they cannot hurt</em>
  </p>
  <p>
    <em>You may have everything<br/>But I know you sleep alone</em>
  </p>
</blockquote><p>He made it only an hour into the day before his father called him into his office to spew hatred and abuse at him. Rhys just stood there and took it. Even this had become routine, the pain. It only reserves to remind him how badly he wants to break free, to make a name for himself, to not be a copy of this man in front of him, to break the endless cycle of son becoming father. But it felt hopeless, as he lost himself a little more everyday, making it harder to put words on the page. Breaking free was becoming impossible and in his future, he could only see bleak nothingness.</p><p>In a blink the day passed. He can’t remember the taste of his lunch or the words that he had spoken. Had he even talked to someone today? He didn’t know. Rhys only knew the bone deep exhausted as he slumps down in a seat on the subway.</p><p>That’s when he saw it, a bright spot of color. A splash of paint in a messy braid. A braid on the head of the most beautiful woman he had ever seen. She glowed somehow, in the dim lights underground, a natural flush colored her cheeks, her eyes so beautifully alive.</p><p></p><blockquote>
  <p>
    <em>There’s paint in your hair.</em>
  </p>
  <p>
    <em>The world around us passes by<br/>Blurred, unimportant<br/>I can only see the brightness there<br/>Coloring the strands of your braid</em>
  </p>
  <p>
    <em>I breathe and can taste the air around me<br/>I can feel my heartbeat again</em>
  </p>
  <p>
    <em>The paint is vibrant</em>
  </p>
  <p>
    <em>It looks like living</em>
  </p>
</blockquote><p>Rhys is enraptured by her. She doesn’t see him, he is sure, her eyes glued to the book in her hands, she doesn’t seem to realize that she has fundamentally altered the meaning to his entire existence.</p><p>Time for him is now forever marked by her appearance into his life, the before and the after. After is much the same as before, same endless days, same soulless job, but he marks each day now, anticipates each train ride home, eager to just breathe the same air for just a few moments.</p><p></p><blockquote>
  <p>
    <em>I’ll never speak to you<br/>I’ll never ask your name<br/>I’ll never diminish your light<br/>By bringing my darkness<br/>Into your life<br/>I’ll stay on the sidelines<br/>I’ll be a face in the crowd<br/>I’ll always be the shadow<br/>Content to be in your orbit<br/>For as long as I can</em>
  </p>
  <p>
    <em>And I’ll be grateful</em>
  </p>
</blockquote><p>Rhys never intended to get to know her. He never intended to pursue the strange pull he felt to her. He was too broken of a person to inflict himself of someone else. It was enough for him, to know she existed, that something so beautiful could still thrive in this world. It was enough that she unstopped the words in his soul and allowed them to flow freely onto the pages.</p><p>The late nights writing finally feverishly catch up to him though. His work suffers and his father yells at him more, but he doesn't care. He falls asleep all the time now, at his desk, eating lunch, on his commute. Which is how he finds himself being shaken awake by a soft voice that sounds like the answer to every question in the universe.</p><p>“Isn’t this your stop?”</p><p>He barely has time to register who the voice is coming from before he has to dash off the train.</p><p></p><blockquote>
  <p>
    <em>Your voice like music<br/>Wakens me from my slumber<br/>In more ways than one</em>
  </p>
</blockquote><p>“Thank you,” he says when he spots her the next day. Her answering smile is too brilliant for words. She slides over, making space for him on the bench next to her, and she nods to the empty chair, her meaning clear.</p><p>“I’m Feyre,” she says, and extends her hand.</p><p>“Rhys.”</p><p>Her fingers are small and warm in his hand.</p><p>It feels like it belongs there</p><p>Your hand in mine</p><p>But I let go</p><p>No one should have to be with to me</p><p>Everyday, she slides over, and makes a space for him, next to her, and they talk. He learns she teaches art at a high school, that she loves books but hates to read, that she’d rather watch a sunset than a sunrise. She tells him about her finance that she adores and her sisters that are as different as night and day, but somehow compliment each other.</p><p>Rhys soaks it all in, everything she shares with him. He shares right back. He tells her about his brothers that he found and made his own, his cousin that annoys him but he can’t live without. The mother and sister he lost long ago. But he hides from her the dark parts, his father, a head of red hair, the reasons he hides away from his found family. Somehow, he thinks she knows.</p><p>And he pretends it doesn’t hurt, knowing she’s happy with someone else.</p><p></p><blockquote>
  <p>
    <em>Lives are like books<br/>They tell a story</em>
  </p>
  <p>
    <em>Other people are written in<br/>They take up space</em>
  </p>
  <p>
    <em>Sometimes just a sentence<br/>Others a chapter</em>
  </p>
  <p>
    <em>Some people though<br/>They rewrite the whole plot</em>
  </p>
  <p>
    <em>I’m content to be a page in yours<br/>Really, I am</em>
  </p>
</blockquote><p>For one short month, he sits by her. For one short month, he thrives. He doubles the amount of words written. He sleeps again and dreams come instead of nightmares. He even finds the energy to go out, to see his brothers again. Cassian and Azriel don’t comment on the time he was somewhere else, was someone else. Instead they drink and laugh and talk again, like he had never pushed them away. He calls his cousin everyday, and she gushes about the girl shes seeing. Mor thinks she might be the one. Rhys agrees.</p><p>Feyre teaches him how to live again.</p><p>Something changes though. Feyre becomes more quiet, their conversations flow less freely, the words stilted. Her eyes become hollow, her face thinner, her smiles all but vanish. Rhys tries to draw her out again and again, but eventually he has to give up. Instead, day in and out, he just sits next to her, hoping she knows she’s not alone.</p><p></p><blockquote>
  <p>
    <em>The light in your eyes<br/>It used to shine bright</em>
  </p>
  <p>
    <em>But now it dimming<br/>Growing fainter everyday</em>
  </p>
  <p>
    <em>What will happen<br/>If it goes out</em>
  </p>
</blockquote><p>It’s a rainy day, and the subway is packed, more full than normal, the press of bodies fill in the air with the stench of musty sweat. Rhys barely notices. He’s standing today, his typical seat next to Feyre taken by a frail old woman. There was a feeling of finality, when he gave up the seat, like whatever had been is over.</p><p>He looks at her now, hardly recognizable. There is nothing he can do to draw her out, to fill the emptiness in her eyes. Rhys can only watch her fading away. He wonders if this was how he was like, caught in that endless nothing.</p><p>The train shudders to a halt, another misfortune in a day full of them. When it's clear there is no hope for a quick fix, the passengers are asked to disembark. All around him, people shuffle off, thankful to breathe cleaner air, but Feyre stays slumped in her seat, fast asleep. She’s skeletally thin now, with dark shadows under her eyes. There’s not a speck of paint on her.</p><p>Rhys tentatively shakes her awake, fearing the slightest pressure will break her frail body. Still, she hisses in pain as she startles awake. Feyre cowers from his touch, grasping her arm as if branded. Her eyes meet his, full of fear. And he knows. He knows what those long sleeves hide.</p><p></p><blockquote>
  <p>
    <em>How did I not see it<br/>The empty eyes<br/>The heavy shoulders<br/>The soulless smile<br/>The hidden marks</em>
  </p>
  <p>
    <em>You’re the same kind of broken as me</em>
  </p>
</blockquote><p>Rhys leads her off the train and onto the platform to a more secluded corner. He takes her wrist gingerly in his hand and meets her eye, silently asking permission. She nods in reply and gently, he rolls back her sleeve. What he sees horrifies him.</p><p>There are tears in her eyes when he looks up again. She doesn’t have to tell him what happened, he already knows. He stood in her place before. He rolls back down her sleeve and then fishes around in his coat for the cards he knows he has stashed away. Rhys is grateful that in the haze of his depression, that he never got around to emptying out those pockets.</p><p>“My brother, the police officer, this is his information. He...he can help you. Get you out, keep you safe, send you somewhere you won’t be found,” he says.</p><p>Feyre accepts the card with shaking hands. When she looks at him again, there are tears in her eyes.</p><p>“If I call this number, I won’t see you again, will I?” her voice trembles as she speaks.</p><p>Rhys shakes his head, unable to say the words. Though he longs for her to stay, his heart is begging her to take the number and go, save herself. Feyre steals herself and then nods, her decision made. She reaches up and brushes a kiss across his cheek.</p><p>“Thank you,” she whispers.</p><p>And then she’s gone.</p><p>The next day, she isn’t on the train.</p><p></p><blockquote>
  <p>
    <em>You saved me<br/>When I couldn’t<br/>I hope I did the same</em>
  </p>
</blockquote><p>Life goes on. He gets published. The book is a sleeper hit and Rhys finally has the means to break free from his father. He moves to a quieter apartment, where he can think, where he can be at peace. He goes out to drinks, he meets Mor’s girlfriend. He actually invites people to his place. He learns to grow herbs in his window boxes. He lives.</p><p>Sometimes though, he can feel Cassian’s heavy gaze on his back. They never speak of her.</p><p>He dedicates his book to her.</p><p></p><blockquote>
  <p>
    <em>To the girl on the train</em>
  </p>
  <p>
    <em>With the paint in her hair</em>
  </p>
  <p>
    <em>And the light in her soul</em>
  </p>
  <p>
    <em>Thank you</em>
  </p>
</blockquote><p>A year passes. Then two. Then three.</p><p>He’s back in the city for the day. He moved out when people started recognizing him everywhere, when girls would show up to his signings with paint in their hair. It was too much for him. The suburbs are nice though. Quiet. He is able to write more, which is good. His publisher is hounding him for a sequel.</p><p>But today he’s not writing. Mor’s daughter is having her first birthday and Rhys knows he’s dead if he misses it. So here he is, back on the crowded subway, headed uptown, when he spots it. A flash of color in a messy braid.</p><p>It shouldn’t be real. It's the wrong train, the wrong time of day, the wrong day of the week. But there she is, sitting on the subway, looking happier and healthier than she had been, his book in her hand. The red string of fate brought them back together again.</p><p>She spots him and a wide grin fills her face. He can’t tell if she’s laughing or crying when she slides over and makes space for him next to her. Rhys doesn’t even hesitate and settles in next to her. Feyre slips her hand into his, their fingers twinning together.</p><p>“You wrote this for me, didn’t you?” she asks.</p><p>“Yes,” he brings her hand to his lips and presses a gentle kiss to her knuckles.</p><p>When he gets off the train, she comes with him, still holding his hand.</p><p></p><blockquote>
  <p>
    <em>This is life</em>
  </p>
  <p>
    <em>Your hand in mine<br/>Splashes of paint <br/>across our table<br/>Quiet stillness<br/>Of early mornings<br/>My too big shirt <br/>Swallowing your frame<br/>The smile on your face<br/>As you kiss me goodmorning</em>
  </p>
  <p>
    <em>This is life</em>
  </p>
  <p>
    <em>This is living</em>
  </p>
</blockquote>
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